January over already? What?

There I go again. That same sick feeling that sweeps over me when I realize the month is almost over. Already!! Gah. I sat myself down yesterday and made a list of all the things I DID complete in these first, few weeks of the new year. It was a pretty good list and, yay! even included fresh writing.

So why this sense of dread instead of celebration?

Some of it, I'm sure, is knowing deep down the tasks and projects I accomplished weren't the truly important ones. The ones I have on my big list of  "This is the year for ...." Were they necessary? Sure. Were they my big ambitions and the yearnings of my heart? Not all of them.

/But I'm not throwing my hands up in despair. I learned a lot last year and practiced sitting on my shiny-object-loving-perfectionist-self until I was able to break my tasks into small doable chunks. Progress!

This year I'm going to combat that feeling of dread by practicing my decision-making skills. Choosing the truly important items for each day and making sure, no matter what, I get them done.
Isn't that the advice we keep hearing and reading? Surprise! The experts aren't just talking out their hats. LOL.

Another piece of expert advice I've taken to heart this January is deciding who I allow in my inbox. Who do I let bombard my limited time and attention with their demands? I've gone through and unsubscribed from a lot of the email and newsletters I've been subscribed to. You know, the ones that pop up every morning and you just swipe to delete rather than open.

I am as much a hoarder of information as I am office products, so I found the task both difficult and painful, and still have more to go. But I think I'm on the right track because when I opened my email this morning I was surprised at how little new stuff was there.

And how much money I've saved this month. Insert "spending" into the following quote in place of "killing" and suddenly, it makes all kinds of sense.

“What does he do, Clarice? What is the first and principal thing he does, what need does he serve by killing? He covets. How do we begin to covet? We begin by coveting what we see every day.”
― Thomas Harris, The Silence of the Lambs

How do you feel as we wave goodbye to the first month of 2020?